About Us

About the Monticello Fire Department

The Monticello Fire Department... has proudly served our community for over 144 years. Ours is a combination department consisting of six (6) professional career firefighters and 65 professional volunteer firefighters. The fire district we serve consists of the entire Village of Monticello and the western portion of the Town of Thompson that surrounds the Village. This amounts to approximately 65 square miles in Sullivan County, New York.

In 2007, the Monticello Fire Department was awarded The Seal of Excellence by the National Fallen Firefighter Life Safety Interactive Program, Everyone Goes Home. In 2008, we were awarded The 2008 Code of Fearless Award by the National Fallen Firefighter Foundation and the New York Firefighters Burn Center Foundation.

In addition to handling an average of 1300 calls per year, The Monticello Fire Department also responds to all life threatening medical calls within our district. Twenty-five of our members are trained New York State Emergency Medical Technicians (EMTs).

Also in 2007, the Monticello Fire Department created the first Trench Collapse Unit in Sullivan County to respond to trench rescues and building collapses. Staffed by professional volunteers, the Monticello FD Trench Collapse Team has undergone extensive and specialized training to better serve our community and to assist neighboring county fire departments in the event of these types of emergencies. Recognizing the need for this specialized unit, MFD Chief Marc Friedland and Carl Houman (former Director of Fire Safety), with the assistance of grants made possible by Assembly Woman Aileen Gunther and State Senator John Bonacic, and the dedicated members of the Monticello Fire Department, made the Trench Collapse Unit a reality and ready to respond.

We strive to provide the highest level of fire protection, fire safety education, and emergency medical service to our community, while also striving for improved productivity and cost-effective use of our resources.

Our Mission Statement

The Monticello Joint Fire District was once a single-service entity. The responsibility of the fire service was fire suppression. Now we have evolved into an emergency service that provides fire protection, fire prevention education, fire code enforcement, plan review, emergency medical services, hazmat and a multitude of specialized rescues. Any of these services may be needed at any given time, and we must be ready to adequately perform these services at a moment's notice. We are given resources by the community, and in turn, we take the responsibility to provide a quality service or the consequences will be felt by the losses in our community.

The backbone of our service is training, education, and experience. It is essential that we train, educate, and provide experience as you would to any other profession. Professionalism through learning is the key to our future. Today's fire department is essentially incomplete and virtually non-functional without adequate education and training. Your life could depend on it!

To read about the history of the Monticello Fire Department, click here.